'Survivor:' A big pot of chaos

Night 19, and we love the smell of paranoia in the darkness. Jonathan, one of the two returning players left in the game, is upset and confronting everyone who voted for him. Denise confesses to voting for him and having her own strategy. Former baseball player Jeff is selling some story about going down with a sinking ship or saving his own rear end.

Michael, the other returning player, vows to not go home after Jonathan, and suggests biding their time to see who cracks first. He encourages Jonathan to keep fighting. And then we are treated to the disturbing site of the other tribe members settling in to sleep the sleep of the untargeted, while Jonathan, lies alone, starring at the stars and looking like someone contemplating ways to snuff torches without waiting for tribal council, if you get our drift.

Morning comes and we see fish everywhere, but it's only a cruel joke as we watch Jonathan searching for Nemo and finding Zippo. No fish for dinner.

Former teen star Lisa has a confab with Jeff, who is considering that she might be useful. But before we learn exactly how, it's reward challenge involving fish. Well, fish traps, anyway.

Reward challenge

The tribe divides into two teams. People swim out to fish traps, dive down to unhook them and the team pulls trap and person back to shore. When all four traps are back, one person digs in the sand for a key that unlocks a puzzle frame. Once that is done, the team will assemble the cloth puzzle pieces into a banner. First to solve the puzzle wins a trip floating down the river on a barge full of food.

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On the Blue Team are Michael, Pete, Abi, Ardis and Carter; the Yellow Team is Jeff, Lisa, Malcolm, Jonathan and Denise.

The Yellow Team starts strong but slows down when Lisa can't swim quickly. But on the Blue Team, Michael loses valuable time when he can't see in the water. The Yellow Team catches up and passes the Blues, and with incredible speed, they assemble the banner and win reward.

The losers head back to Dangrayne to whine and talk strategy. Abi starts telling everyone who is in her alliance and who is out to get her, including members of her own alliance. At least in her mind. Well, actually because she complains and suspects so many people of betraying her, Pete does consider getting rid of her but he won't because he needs her and she's not likely to win the million dollars.

Meanwhile, the winning five float down the river, stuff their faces and talk about the evil alliance of Pete, Ardis and Abi. Jonathan announces he knows he has no chance of winning, but he would love to see the four people he's sitting with go to the end. Uh, no one really buys his "aw shucks, I'm not worthy" act, but at least no one seems actively plotting against him at the moment. At least not on the river boat. Back at Camp Bully, Pete is focusing in on Jonathan as the next to go. He's thinking about keeping Michael for a while yet, though.

The next day, Lisa has a plan. She goes to Michael and reveals her big idea to align with Pete, Ardis and Abi, giving them a five-four advantage over Denise, Malcolm, Carter and Jeff, assuming that Johnathan is out that night.

Immunity challenge

And speaking of getting rid of someone, it's time for the immunity challenge. The goal is to untie three bags with puzzle pieces. The first three to retrieve their bags move on to the next and final round, where they'll use the pieces to complete a snake puzzle.

Pete and Jeff finish first and it comes down to Jonathan and Michael for the third spot. By the most narrow of margins, Jonathan dives across the finish line ahead of Michael and into the finals.

And in a twist that is classic "Survivor," Jonathan actually rips through the puzzle and wins his first ever individual immunity, throwing everyone's plans into a tizzy.

After the challenge, we are treated -- and we use the word advisedly -- by Jonathan's self-satisfied smirk and proclamation that it is the best thing he's ever done, ever.

Jeff is planning to vote for Michael and it's no secret. But Lisa, wanting to save Michael, goes to Pete and spills the beans that Malcolm has a hidden immunity idol. She thinks he's the biggest threat and wants to blindside him. It's a good plan until Pete decides to ask Malcolm if he has the idol. Malcolm denies it and Pete outs Lisa as the person who ratted on him.

Pete believes Malcolm when he denies having it and he now thinks Lisa is playing some weird game. But instead of turning on her, he tells his alliance to vote off Jeff. But Malcolm tells Jeff about the plan and Carter is briefly offered up before they decide on Pete. At last count, there are 246 alliances and two dozen people being considered to be voted off, which is odd because there are only 10 people still playing.

Tribal council

Malcolm tells Jeff Probst that Lisa threw him under the bus, which she admits and explains what she did and why. Abi mouths off about alliances and betrayal. Probst slaps her down. Malcolm pulls out his idol and says he's going to play it. Probst asks if anyone else has an idol to get it out in the open and Abi pulls out hers. It's madness.

The tribe votes and no one plays their idols after all. The votes are one for Abi, four for Pete and five for Jeff, who becomes the second member of the jury. And man, is he bitter. He complains that he made $60 million in his baseball career and the $1 million is nothing and he doesn't want it anyway. Then he went out to suck on lemons.

Probst says that the vote may go down as the biggest blown opportunity in the history of the game, but he says that almost every week, so whatever.

Next time: Lisa gets bullied by her alliance -- you know, the one she just led into voting off Jeff, and she considers going over to Jonathan's alliance.